The Double Bonus

I’m going to hold off on coming up with a preseason Top 25 until the deadline for underclassmen to declare for the NBA Draft passes April 25. That way we’ll have a much better idea of what the teams will look like. But in the meantime, if you can’t wait until the end of the month there are plenty of other big-time national writers who have put their lists out – for the sole reason that their editors made them do it. After all, nothing gets page views like lists. So here’s a sampling of what the “experts” were thinking right after last week’s national championship game.

Luke Winn, SI.com

1. Duke, 2. Michigan State, 3. Butler, 4. Kansas State, 5. Purdue

Jeff Goodman, FoxSports.com

1. Duke, 2. Michigan State, 3. Butler, 4. Purdue, 5. Ohio State

Gary Parrish, CBSSports.com

1. Michigan State, 2. Duke, 3. Butler, 4. Purdue, 5. Villanova

Mike DeCourcy, Sporting News

1. Duke, 2. Ohio State, 3. Michigan State, 4. Purdue, 5. Butler

Andy Katz, ESPN.com

1. Purdue, 2. Duke, 3. Butler, 4. Michigan State, 5. Pitt

Mike Miller, NBCSports.com

1. Michigan State, 2. Duke, 3. Butler, 4. Purdue, 5. Pitt

Rush The Court

1. Duke, 2. Butler, 3. Purdue, 4. Michigan State, 5. Georgetown

So there seems to be a consensus among the masses. Duke, Butler, Michigan State and Purdue, generally in that order. And no Kentucky to be found. Kind of tough when it seems like your entire team leaves for the NBA, but no one will cry for John Calipari anytime soon.

Duke’s No. 1 preseason status will depend heavily on whether Kyle Singler comes back to school. Purdue could creep up should Robbie Hummel’s rehab from a torn ACL roll on without any setbacks. And the darlings of March, Butler, will hold their breath to see what Gordon Hayward decides to do. He’d be a first round pick this June. But does he want to improve his draft status and shoot for another deep run in the tournament?

So check back in a few weeks and we’ll run down next season’s top 25 a good seven months before the first tip. And know that we’re doing this out of the goodness of our heart. No editor pressure. Promise.

For that one fleeting second you thought you were about to witness the improbable. Again.

In this 2010 NCAA tournament, where improbable replaced convention as the norm, Gordon Hayward’s 40-foot heave with time expiring was supposed to go in.

Butler was supposed to complete a thrilling victory, complete its amazing mid-major run to a national title that its kind isn’t supposed to be able to compete for.

The storybook ending was playing our before out eyes. Improbably.

But a funny thing happened just before Hayward’s heave hit the backboard, then the front iron, before falling to the hardwood floor of Lucas Oil Stadium.

Convention finally revealed itself at the 59:59 mark of the national championship game, in the final second of the tournament that was unlike any other. Fittingly, Duke was crowned the 2010 national champion. Underdog Butler’s run had come to a thrilling yet heartbreaking end.

In one of the best national championship games we’ve seen in recent memory, No. 1 Duke survived No. 5 Butler, 61-59, to capture the school’s fourth national championship. In the process, coach Mike Krzyzewski joined the likes of John Wooden and Adolph Rupp as the only coaches in college basketball history to win that many titles.

It ended a long drought for Coach K whose previous Final Four trip was six years ago and last national title came in 2001. Yet again, Duke was the last team left standing on the first Monday in April. Here’s how the Blue Devils did it.

– One of Duke’s best defensive teams in the program’s storied history did a great job against Butler. The Bulldogs incurred another agonizing scoring drought in the game’s waning minutes and finished the evening shooting just 34.5 percent from the field. The Blue Devils forced Butler to take difficult shots all evening long and the Bulldogs missed a number of contested shots right around the bucket. Matt Howard was just 3 of 8 from the field, having layup after layup rim out in the first half while Hayward, Butler’s leading scorer who averaged 15.6 points per game this season, shot a measly 2 of 11 from the field – his worst performance of the season – to finish with just 12 points. Hayward did not hit a shot from beyond the arc and Kyle Singler was a big reason for that. He did a great job defending Hayward, hounding him with his length and forcing him to take tough shots at weird angles. Singler played great help defense, finishing with 2 blocks but he undoubtedly altered more than that. He had plenty of help from Brian Zoubek who was a big presence in the post when he wasn’t on the bench with foul trouble. After the game, Butler coach Brad Stevens spoke of Duke’s adjustment that saw the Blue Devils pack in the middle to cut off the lanes to the basket that Butler was taking advantage early on. The scoring opportunities became scarcer as the game wore on. That scoring drought that we saw from Butler against Michigan State in the national semifinal reared its ugly head again. They were able to overcome it against the Spartans Saturday. Not so Monday against Duke.

– Duke finally took control of the glass in the second half. After being badly out-rebounding in the first half – Butler had a 10-3 advantage on the offensive glass in the first half – the Blue Devils reestablished their presence underneath after halftime. Duke finished with 36-32 rebounding edge and narrowed the offensive rebounding gap to 12-11. The extra opportunities Duke got from the rebounds did two things: It gave them added chances to score, which they capitalized on, and secondly, it allowed them to run a lot of time off the clock, giving Butler significantly fewer possessions in the game’s final five minutes. And when you’re already having trouble putting the ball in the basket, having fewer chances to do it magnifies the problem.

– Butler played its typical excellent defense but the Bulldogs did not hold an opponent to under 60 points for the first time since their regular season finale. Jon Scheyer, Nolan Smith and Singler – Duke’s big three scorers – were not frustrated offensively to the level that many of Butler’s other NCAA tournament opponents were. Scheyer finished with 15 while Smith had 13. Singler, who was named the tournament MOP, had a game-high 19. Butler did not make it easy on Duke, they had a tough time scoring for sure. But Duke made baskets when they needed it in the second half. The majority of their points came from inside the 3-point line Monday, a relative rarity for Duke this season. The Blue Devils made just 5 of 17 from downtown, but still shot 44 percent for the game, making 51 percent of their 2-point attempts.

Sick of the whole David vs. Goliath theme?

If you’re not already you surely will be by the time tonight’s national championship game tips-off. Duke has returned to its role of being the big, bad favorite that everyone loves to hate while mid-major Butler, playing in its hometown, is the underdog hoping to complete a storybook ending this evening.

Both have taken very different paths to get here yet feature many similarities. So who has the edge? Here’s are the keys to tonight’s game as the 2009-10 college basketball season officially comes to end.

Duke vs. Butler
Line: Duke -7.5, O/U 128
KenPom: Duke -7
Location: Indianapolis
TV: CBS, 9:21 pm

If You Like Defense: First thing’s first. When comparing these two you start with defense because they both excel on that end. Duke and Butler are among the nation’s best when it comes to the defensive efficiency ratings. Duke sits at No. 3 nationally in the ratings, giving up an average of 85.8 points per 100 possessions, while Butler comes in at No. 6, allowing 86.4 points per 100 possessions. Butler has the advantage when it comes to points allowed per game but can you chalk that up to the lesser conference competition they’ve played? To a degree, yes, but look at what Bulldogs have done in the tournament holding UTEP, Syracuse, Kansas State and Michigan State to 59 points or less. Butler just defends the hell out of teams in the half court. They don’t have a shot blocking presence. They don’t have a true lockdown guard on the perimeter. They just play great half court team defense and are phenomenal at forcing turnovers without the help of a full court press of any other kind of pressure defense. Considering Duke’s struggles at making 2-point baskets, that plays into the hands of Butler big time. That being said, Duke features its best defensive team arguably in coach Mike Krzyzewski’s long tenure with the Blue Devils. They’re longer and bigger than Butler and we saw the Bulldogs struggle mightily to establishe any kind of low post presence when Matt Howard wasn’t on the floor against Michigan State Saturday. And even when he was out there, Howard had to work like a dog to get any sort of decent shot off. Duke should rule the paint tonight. Butler will launch a lot of 3s.

Duke's Kyle Singler attempts to block the layup attempt from West Virginia's Joe Mazzulla in Saturday's national semifinal. (AP)

Size Does Matter: Duke will have a decided height-advantage underneath and Howard, he of the mild concussion suffered Saturday in the win over Michigan State, is actually questionable for the game. No way he doesn’t play but he will have a tall order trying to box out Brian Zoubek. As we’ve said for the past several days, Duke is a excellent offensive rebounding team and they’re going to get plenty of second chance opportunities tonight unless Butler somehow is able to keep Duke from crashing the boards. Between Zoubek, Kyle Singler and the Plumlee brothers, Butler does not have the bodies to matchup with Duke. Expect plenty of passes to the perimeter tonight off Duke misses. And just like they did against West Virginia, expect the Blue Devils to bury a number of those second chance 3s.

Get Low: Butler wants this game to be like the one we saw against Michigan State. Slow, methodical, plodding and hopefully no more than 110 total points scored. That’s the way Butler wins games. They can’t get into a shootout with Duke because it doesn’t have the firepower to keep up. Now it’s not like Duke is a run-and-gun type of team either but it certainly has more offensive weapons at its disposal than Butler. While I think the matchup on the front line and Duke’s dominance on the boards will be most telling, the second most telling matchup of the game will be the job Butler does on Duke’s guards, Jon Scheyer and Nolan Smith. Shelvin Mack and Ronald Nored will have their hands full this evening chasing around those two. Scheyer and Smith have combined to score 91 points in the Blue Devils’ last two games. But we’ve seen Mack, Nored and the rest of the Bulldogs do a pretty good job of holding down some of the tournament’s best offensive guards like Andy Rautins, Jacob Pullen and Korie Lucious. None of them had good games against Butler – just like their teams.

Star Power: Gordon Hayward’s going to have to take Butler on his back in this one. On the big stage, Butler’s best player will need to shine brightest for the Bulldogs to keep this one close and have a chance to steal it in the final minutes. The best players are supposed to play their best in the biggest games. And not only is Hayward Butler’s best player, but he’s probably be the best player on the court tonight. All you have to do is look at the NBA Draft projections. Hayward’s considered to be a first-round pick should he leave school early. No Duke player is projected to be selected this June.

Butler coach Brad Stevens and the Bulldogs have won 25 straight games. (AP)

The Bench: It’s Coach K vs. baby-faced Brad Stevens. Krzyzewski is going for his fourth national title tonight while Stevens is just in his third year of being the head coach at Butler. Clearly the advantage is in Krzyzewski’s favor. In fact, it’s not even a competition. But Stevens has been getting a lot of pub for his cool, calm demeanor. It’s gotten Butler this far and the coach has shown no signs of panic. No reason to think tonight will be any different. One other subplot. Could this be Krzyzewski’s last game coaching the Blue Devils?

Prediction: Duke 70, Butler 61. As much as I want to see the Bulldogs win – for the wonderful story it would be and for the fact that I predicted Duke would never get to the Final Four months ago, then repeatedly writing how they would be bounced early in the tournament once the brackets were released, setting me up for what could be plenty of ridicule – I just don’t think it’s going to happen. Duke’s got plenty of momentum. All the key players are seemingly at the top of their game right now. They have a huge size advantage and one of the all-time greats calling the shots. I never thought I’d be writing this – this is not a great Duke team by any stretch of the imagination – but your 2010 national champion will be the Blue Devils. The haters will be out in full force tonight.

Duke picked a pretty good time to play its best game of the season.

Behind a scintillating offensive performance, Duke crushed West Virginia Saturday night, 78-57, in the second national semifinal game. The Blue Devils earned a trip to their first national championship game since 2001 where the story of the 2010 tournament, Butler, awaits Monday evening. Here’s how the Blue Devils did it.

– Duke just couldn’t be stopped from behind the arc. The Blue Devils knocked down 13 of their 25 attempts from 3. They did what they do best: Hit the deep shot. The combination of Jon Scheyer, Kyle Singler and Nolan Smith couldn’t be stopped by West Virginia’s defense. The trio hit 12 of the team’s 13 3s, Scheyer himself knocked down 5, finishing with a game-high 23 points. Singler went for 21 while Smith added 19. Comically, the contributions of those three was all the scoring Duke needed. West Virginia just had no answer for Duke defensively. The Blue Devils scored 16 2-point field goals, more than half of their game total. That’s worth nothing because most of Duke’s scoring comes from behind the arc – they’re not a great 2-point field goal scoring team. The efficiency ratings bore that out this season. But it didn’t matter Saturday. The Blue Devils did just about everything right offensively. Duke’s 78 points were the fourth most allowed by the Mountaineers this season.

– Duke killed West Virginia on the offensive boards. While the margin doesn’t reveal that the Blue Devils had some absurd edge on the offensive glass (11-9 in favor of Duke), it only seemed that way. You’d have to dig a little deeper in the box score to realize how badly the Blue Devils abused the Mountaineers underneath. Duke finished with a 19-7 advantage in second chance points, a 12-0 difference in the first half. We knew coming into this one that Duke was a very good offensive rebounding team and boy did it show Saturday.

– West Virginia was pretty brutal offensively. The Mountaineers just couldn’t get much going as Da’Sean Butler failed to be a big factor in the first half before going down with what appeared to be a serious knee injury late in the second half. Butler, West Virginia’s leading scorer this season, finished with just 10 points while Wellington Smith and Devin Ebanks went for 12 and 11, respectively. Duke’s defense held West Virginia to just 41 percent shooting from the field and the hot hands that carried them over Kentucky last week in the Elite Eight were nowhere to be found Saturday. West Virginia hit just 5 3-pointers. And considering their offense is predicated on grinding games out and executing on the half court, once the Mountaineers found themselves in a 10-point hole you knew it was going to be very difficult for them to climb back. They needed this to be a close game all the way and hopefully steal it at the end. Duke features one of the best defenses in school history and while West Virginia pulled off more than a few comebacks from big deficits this season, they weren’t going to do it against what statistically has been one of the premier defensive units in the country this season.

The story lives for another two days.

Butler survived Saturday’s first national semifinal, 52-50, sending Michigan State home in a very tight, hard-nosed defensive game. The “mid-major” playing mere miles from its campus, making for one of the fuzziest story lines the Final Four has seen in years, continued its improbable run toward the title. Here’s how the Bulldogs pulled off the win and moved onto Monday night’s national championship game.

– Despite having only one field goal in the final 12:38, Butler won this game the same way they’ve won their previous 24 games this year. With defense. Michigan State struggled to get good looks around the basket all night long for two reasons: Butler has a great half court defense and the Bulldogs forced Michigan State to make a ton of mistakes. It was a formula that led to the Spartans finishing with their second lowest point total of the season.

Michigan State just couldn’t hang onto the ball. The Bulldogs, despite not featuring a pressure defense that hounds you full court, has an incredible knack for forcing teams to make mistakes in the half court set and that was on display Saturday. Michigan State turned it over 16 times while Butler finished with just 8 giving the Bulldogs a ridiculous 20-2 points off turnovers advantage.

Not having Kalin Lucas at point guard finally caught up with the Spartans and coach Tom Izzo admitted as much after the game. The Michigan State point guard, who was sidelined with a torn Achilles’ Tendon, was dearly missed as Korie Lucious and Durrell Summers combined for seven turnovers. Lucious had five on his own.

– While Butler hits its free throws, Michigan State killed itself at the stripe. The Spartans came into the game shooting just 68.8 percent from the line so they weren’t a great free throwing shooting team to begin with. But boy did it show at the worst possible time. State was brutal in the second half, missing 6 of its 11 attempts, finishing the game making just 10 of 18. Butler, meanwhile, found itself in the bonus before the midway point of the second half and made the most of its time on the line; Butler was 17 of 24. Good thing considering the Bulldogs shot just 30.6 percent from the field.

– Michigan State did not do a good enough job of exploiting its significant size advantage in the front court. Raymar Morgan finished with a paltry 4 points. So did Delvon Roe. You can chalk up the lack of production to foul trouble. It seemed like half of the Spartans rotation had at least three fouls midway through the second half. It took away some of their aggressiveness on the offensive end and thankfully it didn’t kill them on the defensive end because Butler was so woeful scoring in the second half. And I think some of the calls by the officials, that seemed to favor Butler, got into the head of the Spartans. Surprisingly, Michigan State only held a slight rebounding edge, 34-30. Look, when Matt Howard, all 6-foot-8 and 230 pound is your big threat underneath as is the case with Butler, you are the very definition of undersized. Michigan State should have finished with a much bigger advantage on the glass.

– Gordon Hayward was great. The sophomore finished with 19 points and 9 rebounds and was the only one doing any kind of scoring for Butler in the first half. In the second half, it was his defense and rebounding that saved the day when the Bulldogs couldn’t buy a bucket.

Duke PG Jon Scheyer. (AP)

The Blue Devils are back.

After a five year hiatus that did not see them advance past the Sweet 16, Duke is in the Final Four and again considered the favorite to win it all. Coach K, his defense and three dynamic scorers are the driving force behind the Blue Devils return to what used to feel like a birth right for the Cameron Crazies.

Are the stars aligned for a fourth Blue Devils national title. Here’s a closer look at Duke.

Coach: Mike Krzyzewski (20th year)
Record: 33-5, 13-3 ACC
Final Fours: 15 (1963, 1964, 1966, 1978, 1986, 1988, 1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1994, 1999, 2001, 2004, 2010), 3 championships (1991, 1992, 2001)
Iconic Coach K : Krzyzewski is 75-22 in the NCAA tournament, the second highest winning percentage among coaches all-time.

How They Got Here

Duke shared the regular season ACC title with Maryland and won the conference tournament championship, earning the No. 1 seed in the South Regional.

First Round: No. 16 Arkansas-Pine Bluff got itself one NCAA tournament victory this year, having won the play-in game three days before facing Duke. The Blue Devils made sure the Golden Lions didn’t come close to a second thanks to the 73-44 dismantling they unloaded on the SWAC champs.

Second Round: Duke’s defense stifled No. 8 Cal, holding the Bears to only 39 percent shooting from the field, as the Blue Devils cruised to an easy 68-53 victory. Duke’s size was too much for the vertically-challenged Bears to overcome. Nolan Smith led the way with 20 points.

Sweet 16: In a grinding game that was ugly to watch, Duke outlasted No. 4 Purdue, 70-57, to move onto the South Regional final. The Blue Devils did it with defense and the combo of Jon Scheyer and Kyle Singler. The two scorers poured in 18 and 24, respectively, while Purdue struggled to come up with any answer for Duke’s superior size underneath. The two teams combined for just 47 points in the first half assuring this game’s place amongst the round of 16′s all-time ugliest contests.

Elite Eight: A career-high 29 points from Smith helped carry the Blue Devils into the Final Four after they trailed No. 3 Baylor late into the second half. The Bears carried a three point lead into halftime and led by just as many with under four minutes to play but couldn’t hold on in the end, falling to Duke, 78-71. Thanks to Smith, some clutch 3-pointers by Scheyer and 17 offensive rebounds in the second half, Duke advanced to Indianapolis, removing the 800-pound guerrilla that had been sitting on the collective backs of Coach K and his players since 2004.

Why They Can Win It All

Offensively speaking, the Blue Devils should be considered the best team of the Final Four participants. Duke has big time scorers in Scheyer and Singler who can knock down the three with regularity while Smith can do a little bit of it all and is the most athletic of the three. Scheyer, Singler and Smith combined average a little over 52 points per game – about 2/3 of the team’s average points per game. And while they may not be a great rebounding team, as we pointed out yesterday, Ken Pomeroy says the Blue Devils are a very good offensive rebounding team – which we clearly saw against Baylor. The Blue Devils will need to capitalize on second chance opportunities against a very good defensive team in West Virginia, their opponent for Saturday’s second national semifinal game. But as good as West Virginia is defensively, the Blue Devils are right there with them.  Pomeroy’s ratings pin the Blue Devils as the nation’s third most efficient defense while West Virginia’s comes in at No. 10. Sometimes Pomeroy’s numbers can be a little misleading – he’s admitted that Duke is probably overrated when it comes to his ratings this year – but it goes to show you how tough it is to score against this Blue Devils team. They have size underneath with Brian Zoubek and the Plumlee brothers and just seem to do a really good job of hounding opponents. They’re good at turning teams over and are allowing opponents to shoot just 27 percent from 3-point range. While this definitely is not Coach K’s most staked team during his long tenure, this relatively “weak” Final Four field puts Duke in prime position to capture another title. It’s pretty obvious to see why they’re the favorite. They have a coach who has been to the Final Four more than any other active coach and pedigree that gives them added swagger.

Why They Won’t

I’ve gone on record as saying this Duke team wouldn’t reach the Final Four and that obviously did not come to fruition. I’ve been adamant all season long that the Blue Devils aren’t very athletic and at some point would get exposed in the tournament for that. Clearly the matchups benefited Duke up until the Baylor game. The Bears were a team built to beat the Blue Devils with its size, athleticism in the backcourt and 2-3 zone defense. The Blue Devils managed to survive and advance but they are a team that does not hit a very high percentage of their 2-point attempts. In fact, Pomeroy says they get less than 50 percent of their points from 2-point attempts, an unusually low number for such a good team. And not a characteristic you generally associate with a champion. They’re overly reliant on the 3-point shot which at some point a team will die by – see Kentucky in the Elite Eight. I still think Duke can be bodied around and physically handled. None of the remaining teams are that big, bruising and physically more imposing than the Blue Devils, but West Virginia certainly comes closest to fitting that category.